British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, survived a vote of no-confidence in his leadership of the Conservative Party Monday evening.
Johnson face a vote of no-confidence in the House of Commons on Monday.
The vote was triggered after about 54 Tory Members of Parliament wrote letters saying they no longer supported Johnson following his “partygate” scandal during the height of the Covid lockdown, which sparked calls for his resignation.
Johnson hailed his 211 to 148 victory in the tense vote by Conservative Members of Parliament as a “convincing result.”
In his reaction, Johnson said it was “a convincing result, a decisive result, and what it means is that as a government we can move on and focus on the stuff that I think really matters to people.”
He added, “I’m grateful to colleagues for the support they’ve given me. What we need to do now is come together as a government and as a party.
“We can focus on what we’re doing to help with the cost of living, what we’re doing to clear the Covid backlog, what we’re doing to make the streets and communities safer by putting more police out.”
Echoing the message of the PM on Twitter, Chancellor Rishi Sunak said, “The PM has won the confidence vote and now it’s time to move forward. Tomorrow we get back to work growing the economy and delivering better public services.”
All 359 Conservative MPs took part in the vote. The PM received the support of 211 Conservative MPs, with 148 voting against him.
Johnson was supported by 59% of his MPs, which is a lower than Theresa May’s 63% of Tory MPs in 2018, who ended up resigning six months later.
With surviving the vote of no-confidence, however, Johnson can continue as the Conservative Party leader and, therefore, prime minister. Following the current rules, Tory MPs cannot hold another vote on Johnson until after 12 months.
The rules can, however, be changed to be able to hold another vote sooner than the current rules allow. When asked about the possibility of such change, Sir Graham Brady MP – who oversees the process – told the British Broadcasting Corporation that “technically, it’s possible.”